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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28122978">Iterating Upon a Keen Sense of Despair</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kalirush/pseuds/kalirush'>kalirush</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Don't Starve (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Art, Canon-typical pyromania, Gen, Incidental rabbit murder</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-11 00:15:37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,028</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28122978</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kalirush/pseuds/kalirush</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Willow awakes in The Constant, a sprawling multiverse of uncertain dimensions and questionable connections. There are, however, a great many berry bushes.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Yuletide 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Iterating Upon a Keen Sense of Despair</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/villain_neet/gifts">villain_neet</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>This, dear reader, is <strong>Willow</strong>. Willow is a brave, quiet girl with a tragic and painful backstory.</p><p>
  
</p><p>Our story begins in a place called <strong>The Constant</strong>, a sprawling multiverse of uncertain dimensions and questionable connections. There are, however, a great many berry bushes.</p><p>Today is the first day that Willow has been awake in the Constant. Today is also the day when she will discover three important truths about her existence. Because you might miss them otherwise, I will alert you to these truths as we encounter them in the narrative. For now, Willow is gathering grass, twigs and berries, in the hopes that they will prove useful to her future survival. The sun is sweeping rapidly through the sky, and darkness will come before long. </p><p>As she tucks a handful of berries into her pocket and moves toward the next bush, she stubs her toe on a sharp piece of flint. As she picks it up, information rushes into her brain. Willow knows how to make an <strong>axe</strong>, and she does so quickly. “It’s very sharp,” she says, reflectively. </p><p>This is the first important truth of her existence: <strong>she must build to survive</strong>. The Constant is not, after all, simply an unending expanse of carrots and berry bushes waiting to be plucked. </p><p>As soon as Willow has an axe, she knows immediately what she must do. There are trees here, and she picks the largest of them. Though she is small, her axe bites deep into the wood when she swings it. Before long, she has reduced the mighty pine to so much firewood. “Night is coming. I need fire!” she says, and she is entirely correct. It has begun to get dark.</p><p>It is at this point that Willow learns the second important truth of her existence: <strong>no one will stop her from building fires</strong>. It cannot be overstated how much this pleases her. “Burn!” she cries.</p><p>She roasts handfuls of berries over the flames, but she built her fire too soon. She has underestimated how fast the wood burns, and before she realizes it, the fire is guttering and she has nothing to stoke it up. The fire goes out.</p><p>There is a heartbeat of stillness, a breath of silence, and then it comes screaming at her. She fumbles desperately with her lighter, blind in the absolute blackness. She ignites the tiny flame, too small against the immensity of the night. The creature retreats.</p><p>This is the third important truth which she learned on her first day in the Constant: <strong>the world will kill her if it can</strong>. “I’m not afraid of you!” she shouts at the darkness. She is lying.</p>
<hr/><p>Six days and nights have passed since last we saw Willow. You can see her here, in her camp. It contains three <strong>chests</strong>, full of things she has picked up in her wanderings. There is a <strong>science machine</strong>. Best of all, there is a <strong>fire pit</strong>. </p><p>
  
</p><p>Willow has begun to feel more comfortable in her surroundings. She has learned to trap and murder <strong>rabbits</strong>, and she roasts their flesh over her fire, the fat crackling and running down her fingers. She has woven the grass into a <strong>straw hat, </strong>which protects her from the rain. And she has placed her camp next to a large forest, which provides ample firewood. She need never worry about running out, so long as she keeps her stockpile full. </p><p>She always keeps her stockpile full.</p><p>She almost misses it when the growling starts. There are many sounds, here in the Constant, and she does not yet know the significance of this one. It ought to startle her. She ought to come to attention, prepare herself against the onslaught. But she has no context, and instead, she ignores it entirely, chopping wood merrily. "Wood! So flammable! Hooray!" she thinks to herself.</p><p>The growling comes again, and this time, Willow notices it. “Show yourself!” she says, brandishing her axe. The growling seems to be coming from everywhere, and nowhere. Willow puts her back to the firepit, lighting a <strong>torch</strong> reflexively. </p><p>Suddenly, the sound localizes. It was coming from <em>anywhere</em> and now it is very distinctly coming from <em>there </em>and from <em>there</em>, from the beasts that burst out of nothingness, snarling with all intent to devour her if they can. Willow screams. The <strong>hounds </strong>are as tall as she is, their teeth as long as her forearm. They slaver. She turns and runs. She runs until her legs are burning, until her lungs are near to bursting, in the hope of staying inches in front of the hounds’ teeth.</p><p>In a stroke of luck, she veers into a nearby swamp. The ground bubbles underneath her feet, and massive, monstrous <strong>tentacles</strong> burst out of the earth as she passes. She screams, and runs faster still. It takes her a moment to realize that the hounds are no longer following. They seem content to attack the tentacles, who seem content in their turn to whip and slash the hounds to death. </p><p>
  
</p><p>She creeps back to her camp, exhausted. That night, as the darkness closes in, she sees the tentacles in her mind’s eye, and shivers. </p>
<hr/><p>Willow has now been in the Constant for twenty days. She does not know it yet, but in moments the season will turn from <strong>Summer </strong>into <strong>Winter</strong>. Survival will become much more difficult as resources that she has come to rely on stop renewing, and temperatures become low enough to freeze. </p><p>She does not know that this will happen, and has not prepared herself. </p><p>The sun rises with its customary fanfare. The light seems strangely cool, and there is a chill in the air. She begins her chores, because they need to be done. If she does not cut wood, she will have no fire when the dark comes. </p><p>She notices other changes as she goes about her chopping. The grass has gone strangely gray, and the rabbits are white now as they run screeching away from her. She strays too close to the cliff’s edge, and huge black birds burst out of the water. She screams and jerks away, but the <strong>pengulls</strong> seem uninterested in her, waddling past her towards an icy patch of ground. </p><p>She makes sure to cut extra wood. It will get colder still when the sun goes down. She lights her fire shortly after dusk. The cold deepens and she stands closer, warming her hands. She is checking the science machine for things to keep her warm when she hears barking.</p><p>This is the third time the hounds have come, and she knows what to do. She will run to the nearby swamp, dodging the tentacles until they deal with the hounds for her. She is not prepared for how bitter the cold grows as soon as she leaves her beloved fire. The wind bites into her as she runs. She runs anyway, because the hounds are close behind, and their teeth are entirely non-metaphorical. Her fingers go numb, and so do her feet. She shivers uncontrollably, but she can feel the hounds’ breath behind her. She makes the swamp and staggers past the tentacles toward solid ground, her mind gone cloudy and slow. </p><p>The hounds are gone now, but she is unsure what direction her camp is in. It is nearly dark. She wants to cry, but she is afraid that her tears will ice over. She knows with a certainty that the cold will kill her if she does not find warmth, and she looks around desperately.</p><p>There are trees nearby. They light easily enough. She sets an entire segment of the forest on fire by accident, but for a time, she is warm and the fire is bright.  </p><p>
  
</p>
<hr/><p>On Willow’s thirty-fifth day in the Constant, she meets a walrus.</p><p>It has been a cold and unpleasant winter. Since that first night, she has learned about <strong>thermal stones</strong> and <strong>rabbit earmuffs</strong>. Now, as the temperature has begun to rise again, she has been exploring again.</p><p>She has been alone for thirty-five days, save for the rabbits and the<strong> beefalo</strong> and the various impending threats of death. She is always busy, and she has never minded being alone. So when she turns a corner and sees <strong>MacTusk</strong>, she is surprised by how desperately she wishes to have someone to speak to. He is not a man, but he is clearly a <em>person.</em> Animals do not wear such smart tartan. She stands mutely for a long moment, staring at him. </p><p>He does not seem to notice her, until he does, and then he does not speak to her. Instead, he shouts and pulls out a blowgun. From behind him, two frost-blue hounds emerge, barking wildly. Willow screams, turns and runs. A <strong>blow dart </strong>slams into her back as she goes, but she has learned nothing in the Constant better than running, and it does not slow her down. "Stop following me!" she weeps, through the pain. </p><p>Later, she will dig the dart out from between her shoulder blades and burn it. One cannot befriend walruses.</p><p>
  
</p>
<hr/><p>Fifty-eight days have passed since Willow entered the Constant. Today, she intends to leave it. </p><p>She has gathered together the <strong>Box Thing</strong>, the <strong>Ring Thing</strong>, the <strong>Metal Potato Thing</strong>, and the <strong>Crank Thing</strong>. She has located the <strong>Wooden Thing</strong>, and she intends to assemble the <strong>Teleportato</strong>. </p><p>She has also found and befriended a small army of <strong>pigs</strong>. They are standoffish and lack a great deal as conversational partners, but they are happy enough to eat the rabbits she has trapped. They will fight for her, she has discovered. This is important, because a small army of <strong>chess monsters</strong> stands between her and the Teleportato, and they will need to be fought. </p><p>She loads up her pack with food and valuable goods. She distributes rabbit meat to Augustus, Tacitus, Licinius, Domitian, Vitellius, Justinian, and Pickles. “I LOVE FRIEND”, they say. “I FOLLOW!”</p><p>They set off toward the Wooden Thing. They dodge <strong>tallbirds</strong> and <strong>spiders </strong>along the way, but she moves quickly before her friends can be distracted. They rush to catch up with her as she runs along the path. They pass the meadow of <strong>bees</strong>, and the <strong>beefalo</strong> pasture, and the hole in the ground that <strong>batilisks</strong> rush out of at night. She has grown fond of them in her time here- even the batilisks, which are delightfully flammable.</p><p>The chess monsters are sleeping when they arrive. She darts in, waking them and drawing their fire. She runs back and forth and the scene dissolves into chaos, pigs punching <strong>Clockwork Knights</strong>, the <strong>Clockwork Bishops’</strong> lightning arcing through the air, and the ground thudding as the <strong>Clockwork Rook</strong> winds up for an attack.</p><p>She dodges between them all, and pulls the Metal Potato Thing out of her pack. It fits perfectly. So do the Box Thing, and then the Crank Thing, and then the Ring Thing, as she rushes to fit them on. She looks back to see Pickles, the last pig standing, fall to the Rook. "I just want to see this world burn," she cries. She hits the button. </p><p>Time stops. The Metal Potato Thing forms into a terrible, laughing face. “Do you want to journey onwards?” it asks her. It warns her that this world will be destroyed. “Let’s go,” she says. </p><p>She wants very much to leave this place.</p><p>
  
</p>
<hr/><p>Today is Willow’s first day in the Constant. She wakes to the same mocking face that looked down at her from the Teleportato moments ago. “Say, pal, you don’t look so good,” he says.</p><p>This is the fourth and final important truth which she learns on her first day in the Constant: <strong>The Constant is infinite</strong>.</p><p>There are, however, a great many berry bushes. And very many extremely flammable trees. Willow gathers herself. She stands. She had hoped that the Wooden Thing would create a doorway back home. When it comes to it, though, did she really enjoy home that much? All those people with <em>opinions</em> about when and where and how she started fires. "I like fire," Willow says, thoughtfully.</p><p>Armed with the knowledge and supplies she gleaned from the previous world, Willow journeys onwards.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks to my betas (redacted until reveals) for both independently insisting that the story had the wrong ending. Hopefully, this version has the right one. </p><p>I love the visual style of Don't Starve and couldn't resist doing some art to go with. I have taken artistic liberties with the Teleportato, of course.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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